Is this the answer in india?

Firstly party-less elections sounds good in theory but may not be practicable.  Imagine 546 independents trying to pass a Bill.  Or the simple question of who will form the government.  What will majority in parliament mean?  The wise people might have thought of all the anwsers, but they elude me.  At the end of the day decisions have to be made on issues and parties being organizations with hierarchies and power structures get the job done.  My thoughts and not some noble truth.

Second, we have to recognize that politicians (like all of us) are driven largely by self interest.  Their goal is to get re-elected.  if development gets them re-elected, well and good.  If it is caste based division and polarization, then they will follow this path.  It is the job of the electorate to make sure that some of their interests overlap with their self interests.  And urban voters need to come out and vote to begin with.  A 55% turnout with booths pretty much within walking distance is simply unacceptable.

Third our participation in the democratic process ends with elections, when it really should be the beginning.  When I read blogs in the US, I read about people writing to their representatives and calling them about the bail-out, e,g,  Once we vote, we seem almost helpless to influence the course of things.  We just don't seem to have access to our MPs and MLAs.  Some system should have been put in place in the 50s itself where things like "town-hall" meetings, etc would happen on a regular basis.  Or am I being just too optimistic?

Ramesh Ramanathan has written a nice little piece called " Awakening and Relevance" and goes on to explain why the urban voter is still largely irrelevant inspite of the candlelight vigils, etc.  http://www.livemint.com/2008/12/17211451/Awakening-and-relevance.html 

I am not sure when we lost our way.

Srivathsa

Yes - this is an important issue. While in most cases the election is based on issues here it is based on other factors such as caste/class/religion  which have very little effect on the secular urban middle class person. Basically the secular urban middle/upper middle class has no vote bank. I have idly toyed with the idea of starting a party to cater to the secular  urban middle class professional and if indeed such a party or canditate exists then I would vote for him or her. I guess in one place - namely South Mumbai, there is such a person but he is part of the Congress.

But perhaps instead of at the national level it would be better if one had elected professionals running the city instead of the nominated officials who can be transferred at will by some disgruntled politician. I fear that the proposed elected Mayor will just become another political farce with a lot of the major parties joining in the fray and the issues will be forgotten - it will just become another battle for the lucrative infrastructure contracts that are up for grabs. And at the end of the day, well, the secular urban middle class professional will continue to suffer.

The point is this that of course at the end of the day the life of a middle class professional is much better than that of a poor villager. But it is getting worse day by day and by and large it is perhaps not true that what the politicians are doing is  improving the lives of the poor. Sure they have kicked out governments for not delivering but its not always the case that the govt that replaces them delivers a great deal either. I think people have stopped expecting anything from the government and in general happy if the things dont get worse. There does not seem to be any accountability.

Jenny - If only you had made your suggestion a few days earlier:))).

Yajamaanre' - the day will be when our elected representatives come on to respond to us on an on-going basis, like Prof Ashwin Mahesh is now doing, but, in addition, in their official capacity.

I will add this to the other prayers I have made today.

Muralidhar Rao